Patty Aubrey, life coach and strategist behind the phenomenal growth of the Chicken Soup for the Soul Series and Jack Canfield Companies, prescribes a few success mantras for women
Make an ‘I Want’ List
Whether its a relationship, a job, a house or a family—make an ‘I want’ list, and make it as specific as possible. When we’re young, we don’t have a lot of I don’t wants, because we don’t know much. It’s only over time and after we’ve tried things and tweaked them that we know better. You will never know what works for you if you don’t try.
Don’t Edit your Dreams
Often, we edit our dreams even before we vocalize them. For me, it’s always about getting to the core of why you want something and wanting it for the right reasons. Often it’s just about being honest. Sometimes it’s embarrassing to talk about a big goal or something we want. In our heads we’re saying, ‘you don’t deserve that. You’re not good enough’. Other people say, ‘you should do this, you’re amazing’; but our behaviour doesn’t match our dreams. We must watch our self-talk to succeed.
Be Passionate
Passion is a big deal. If you’re in a workplace 12 hours a day you have to love what you do. It’s your life. If we’re not happy we go home miserable, nobody wants to be around us. It’s really important for people to figure out what you love, and find your life purpose.
Find a Cheerleader
It took Patty Aubrey’s accountant holding her responsible, for her to start doing retreats three years ago. “I make more money in one day doing a consulting job than I make in 30 days working at my day job. That’s what I call an accountability partner or a mastermind partner. It’s someone who believes in you more than you believe in yourself. In order for you to have the courage, the strength and the stamina to succeed, I think it’s really important that you have another person to hold you accountable,” recommends Patty.
Face Your Failures
Don’t let complacency get the better of you. My life has been very blessed. And it’s because I’ve uncomfortably asked for what I want and I’ve been willing to make mistakes. Feedback and failure used to be the f-words, but now they’re the fun words for me. If you’re not failing and you’re not being rejected then you’re not stretching to a new place. Without some sort of rejection or rebuttal, I feel like I’m being complacent. It’s always important to push for what’s next.
Follow The Rule of Five/Create A Mastermind Group
Do five things a day to get closer to your goal. At the start of every day, spend some time with a colleague (not necessarily your boss) who can hold you accountable, talking about your goals for the day. At the day’s end, review to figure out what you did and didn’t do and what got in the way of productivity. Develop a strategy to ensure that it doesn’t keep happening; this way, you’re not just a rat on a wheel, but are committed to your goals. Because women are more verbal, we can mastermind projects or ideas in groups. I’ve masterminded everything from my work to my home life—making it more effortless, fun and less expensive.
Treat yourself the way you would someone you love
You know all the ‘I’m not good enough, or brave enough or bold enough gibberish’ we keep telling ourselves. It doesn’t help anyone, and certainly not you. Patty believes, “We’re in a very good space right now, a land of opportunity. But it’s crucial that we hold ourselves accountable and take the responsibility to treat ourselves as well as we would treat our children or anyone else we love. If we spoke to our friends the way we talk to ourselves we definitely wouldn’t have any”.
Be Mindful of Your Time
The only thing that we can’t barter or buy is time. So the more mindful we are of our time from the beginning, the happier we are. That’s one of the things that comes from having childcare and delegating the things that you don’t want to do, to admitting where somebody else in your office may be more efficient at doing something. I know I have employees that that will get things done in one-fifth the time that it will take me to do it; so it makes absolute sense. Delegation is a big thing.
Ask, and you shall receive!
However you show up and whatever you ask for, you’re teaching people that this is the way it needs to be. I could have said, ‘I’m just here to run the office and I’m not worth it and I’m not valuable enough and I don’t deserve it’; luckily, my younger sister was a bully and she pushed me to ask. I’m so grateful, because that generated a lot of revenue for me. There were probably ten books I went on to do — Christian Soul, Working Women’s Soul, Working Mother ‘s Soul, Busy Mum’s, Father Daughter, Sisters…— I just started to look at the different markets I was passionate about, at different times of my life.
Explore Alternative Routes
Look at what you want and why you want it. People try to justify in their heads what they need to do before they do what they really want to do! What they really need to do is go straight to what they want. But they have told themselves a story that they have to go a certain route. It’s like saying, I want to go to someplace and there’s only one road, when there are really seven roads; and the road they have chosen is not really the fastest or the most efficient.
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